Building a Mystery
by Swirly Head
Summary: An introspective songfic on Buffy's feelings for Spike...written from Buffy's POV.


As I stare at him for a moment from the other side of the room, I remember that first time. The first   
time our eyes ever met, all of it set to the heavy throb of music that lived inside my heart. If he   
could ever be christened with liquid notes and clashing chords, this would be his song.  
  
you come out at night   
that's when the energy comes   
and the dark side's light   
and the vampires roam   
  
It makes me wonder why he gets to me so deeply, so darkly, so far underneath my ill fitting skin.   
And I know that every time I ask that question I sound like some skanky shallow heroine in some   
cheap bookstand novelette. You know the sort, where there's a guy and a girl. Who proclaim to   
all that they hate each other, build up a whole load of UST, and by the end of the story they   
profess their eternal love and wander off into the sex filled sunset. Well, it isn't going to happen   
like that. For a start he doesn't hate me anymore.  
  
you strut your rasta wear   
and your suicide poem   
and a cross from a faith   
that died before Jesus came  
  
If someone had asked me a year ago who my mortal enemy was, I'd have made some laughing   
comment about having too many to count. If someone had asked me two years ago, I'd have said   
Spike. He wasn't the worst I've ever faced, but he was certainly the strangest. The only one I'd   
ended up working with, the only one who I hadn't killed.  
  
It pissed me off. What annoyed me the most as that he'd fluttered into my life, basically destroyed   
it, and left again. Not a scratch, no extra scars on his lean, smirking face. The other two Slayer's   
had left their mark, as I found out later. With me, it was almost as though we'd never met. It   
annoyed me. I'd wanted to be the one to kill him. I'll admit it now, when Giles told me how he's   
bested two previous Slayers, I held my head a little higher. Here was a challenge. Here was a Big   
Bad.  
  
you're building a mystery   
  
I went in, guns blazing. Thought I'd win. I didn't. Not the first time, not the second, not the   
twentieth. Every time I peeled away another layer, trying to find his center. If you can find the   
core, the driving force, you can make the kill. Keep your friends close, enemies closer? That   
kinda thing. It didn't work. He's still a mystery.  
  
you live in a church   
where you sleep with voodoo dolls   
and you won't give up the search   
for the ghosts in the halls  
you wear sandals in the snow   
and a smile that won't wash away   
can you look out the window   
without your shadow getting in the way   
  
He's a contradiction. Vampire in love with the Slayer. Peroxide punk who loves to listen to   
Shakespeare. Might as well be Dawn's brother, who tells her stories about people he's killed.  
  
  
oh you're so beautiful   
with an edge and a charm   
  
Not forgetting the obvious. Beautiful and he knows it. Even when he's waking up, even when I'm   
slamming his head so hard against a pillar I can almost hear it crack, he's beautiful. I am not a   
vain person, but I notice the way heads turn when we walk down the street together. Striking, the   
dangerous man with the sexy smile and the small young woman with the knowing eyes. Men and   
women stare, and I see the envy in their eyes.  
  
If they knew a little more, if they scratched below the surface, they wouldn't be jealous. All it takes   
is a harsh word from my lips, a sarcastic smirk to mar his face and they turn away once more. We   
spoil ourselves, we really do.  
  
but so careful   
when I'm in your arms   
  
He doesn't touch me anymore. That may sound a little weird, but it's true. Before he loved me we   
would hit each other, push each other. He'd grab my arm to show me something, hold my   
shoulders to make a point. I wouldn't notice, it's the absence that shows what was there before.   
Now our bodies never even brush against each other. We don't sit side by side. I can't even smell   
the bitter scent of cigarettes.  
  
I wonder if he gave them up?  
  
'cause you're working   
building a mystery   
holding on and holding it in   
yeah you're working   
building a mystery   
and choosing so carefully   
  
I wouldn't know. I don't know very much about him.  
  
you woke up screaming aloud   
a prayer from your secret god   
you feed off our fears   
and hold back your tears   
  
I remember when he slept on the couch, after we'd talked. After he'd listened and I'd told him   
about my mom and Dawn. About how I worried. How I went downstairs in the morning and felt the   
urge to shake him, throw him out. As I poured a glass of water he started to mumble in his   
dreams. Secret words, and tears of sweat made his features shine. I thought I heard him ask for   
food, ask for water, ask to be let out, and then I couldn't listen anymore.  
  
give us a tantrum   
and a know it all grin   
just when we need one   
when the evening's thin   
  
I've listened to him a lot, over the years. Years, plural. Have I really known him for so long? And I   
realize that I've never once talked to him, really. Not in the way Dawn has. He'd never tell me so   
much. Not at the moment, anyway. I', not sure how that makes me feel.  
  
Sometimes I've had to struggle not to find his comments amusing, to let myself share a laugh. To   
share a laugh would mean some inner acceptance. Some superficial bond that's been forged. Yet   
he knows how to make me smile, and he knows how to fight and there have been patrols when   
I've longed for company.  
  
Not his, of course. I will never long for him. I won't let myself.   
  
oh you're a beautiful   
a beautiful fucked up man   
you're setting up your   
razor wire shrine  
  
I won't long for him, and I won't let him in. Not until he lets me. Not until I know his mystery.  
  
'cause you're working   
building a mystery   
holding on and holding it in   
yeah you're working   
building a mystery  
  
  



End file.
